Tom Riddle's body only lasted another day, to Hermione's relief. Apparently, just 'existing' in a body was very exhausting when said body was a magical construct composed entirely of one person's magic. Tom was annoyed by this realization, but he was resigned; he'd known it wouldn't last forever.
Hermione spent most of his last day with him in the back yard, practicing wandless magic while her parents were away at work.
"There's a reason wandless magic isn't formally taught or done widely," Tom warned her ahead of time. "It's the same reason wizards turned to wands."
"Why's that?" Hermione asked.
Tom smirked.
"Well," he said. "In the event a spell goes wrong… would you rather your hand blow up, or your wand?"
It was a very good reason to turn to wands, in Hermione's opinion. Nevertheless, she still wanted to learn.
"The key is controlling the amount of your power you use in each spell," Tom said. "It's very difficult for most wizards to feel and manipulate their magic with great skill, and it's earned over time. A wand naturally channels only as much as a particular spell needs, whereas with wandless magic, you have to do it yourself."
They started with levitation, a lesson which lasted maybe two minutes after Hermione sent leaves and sticks dancing through the air in a choreographed number with a gesture, rocks joining in like backup dancers.
"You can do this wordlessly as well as wandlessly?" Tom said, astounded.
"I've been doing it for years, now," Hermione admitted, wincing. "Every night, to drain my magic. At some point, it just became second nature, and I can levitate things without really thinking about it."
Tom was mildly impressed. "We'll move on to summoning, then."
Summoning wandlessly was crucial, he emphasized. If she were to learn any spell to pull off wandlessly, it should be this one – it was the one spell that could get her wand back to her if she were ever disarmed. Hermione eventually conceded to using her actual wand to practice, though it made her nervous to hand it over to Tom. He didn't use it, though, of course - he held her wand out on his open hand while Hermione tried to summon it from several feet away.
It was hard. Hermione was used to mastering a spell quickly within minutes of learning it. Being unable to master wandless magic as quickly as she'd hoped was demoralizing and incredibly frustrating for Hermione. Even knowing it was supposed to be very difficult, somehow she'd hoped she'd be special, somehow. She had imagined that she alone would suddenly have a natural talent for wandless magic, effortlessly mastering the rare skill, and even Tom would be impressed.
That was not what was happening, though.
She just couldn't get it to work. Each time she tried, her magic failed. And each time it failed, she grew more and more frustrated. Failure wasn't something Hermione was used to.
"Accio," she said, her hand outreached towards her wand. Her face screwed up in concentration. "Accio!"
"Your magic is dissipating into the air without a true purpose," Tom said. He was patient. "You need to give your power firm purpose when you cast."
"How can you say it has no purpose when I'm saying the blasted incantation?" Hermione wanted to know, frustrated. "And how can you feel what my magic is doing, anyway?"
Tom gave her a small, secretive smile, and his eyes glittered.
"I'm made of your magic, Hermione," he murmured. "Or have you forgotten?"
His smile was dangerous, and Hermione cursed the way her breath caught in her chest as he looked at her with dark eyes.
"The incantation isn't enough," Tom continued. "Right now, you're just flinging magic out of your body, hoping it works. You're giving your magic a goal, but not a true sense of purpose."
"Well, I don't know how to do that, then," Hermione said, annoyed.
"That's why we're practicing." Tom was ever patient. "Try again."
Hermione reached out, focusing. "Accio."
She was focusing on her magic this time; she, too, felt it dissipate into the air nearly as soon as it left her hand. Frustrated, she reached out with her air magic instead, the air elemental whooping in delight and rushing out, blowing the wand from Tom's hand and sweeping it towards her. She snatched it from the air with a defiant look, and Tom laughed.
"Well, you certainly accomplished your goal," he conceded. He grinned. "You didn't exactly summon it though, did you?"
"I can't." Hermione felt like stomping her foot. "It just doesn't work, Tom. I don't get why I can't get it."
Tom considered her thoughtfully.
"When you reached out with the air elemental," he said, "your magic didn't dissipate into nothingness. Why is that?"
"Probably because the air elemental has a fairly defined sense of identity," Hermione shot back. "It has a sense of purpose that ties the magic together – unlike my magic, apparently."
Tom looked amused. "Hermione, you do realize that the air magic is your magic, don't you?"
"Well, yes," Hermione argued, "but it's my magic filtered through the air elemental, so–"
"You subdued the air elemental," Tom pointed out. "It's part of you, now. Not a separate thing."
"I know that," she snapped. "But you don't get it – it's like…"
She broke off, lost for words. She knew that the elemental inside of her was part of her, but it still was separate, clearly defined even as it meshed with the rest of her.
"If it's the sense of identity that is keeping the air magic together, maybe a sense of identity for your core magic would help that stay together," Tom suggested.
Hermione scoffed. "It has an identity already, doesn't it? 'Hermione's magic'."
"Ah," Tom said, eyes alight, "but what does it mean to be Hermione's magic?"
Hermione groaned.
"Do I really have to do this?" she demanded. "I thought you were going to teach me wandless magic, not a bunch of magical philosophy."
"Sit down," Tom told her, sitting down and folding his legs. "Do you want to learn this or not?"
Hermione acquiesced with poor grace, sitting down on the grass with a glare.
"We're going to do a meditation exercise," Tom said, ignoring her groan. "Take a deep breath in with me, Hermione… and breathe out. Deep breath in… and breathe out."
Attempting to set aside her aggravation, Hermione gave in and closed her eyes, listening to Tom and following his instructions, allowing her breathing to center her and calm her down. Though she'd never admit it, it did help her smooth out her emotions and calm down. It was something she'd gotten accustomed to doing before the coven bond, when her magic would spin off-balance and send her into anxiety spirals.
The soothing rhythm of her breath helped, slowly dissipating the tension Hermione was feeling, letting her frustration and anger and self-doubt seep away. Tom kept her focused on her breathing quietly for several minutes, almost as if he could sense when she'd finally returned to an emotionally neutral state.
"Now: reach for your magic, Hermione, but don't pull on it. Instead, immerse yourself in it. Swim in it. Revel in it. What do you feel?"
Hesitant, Hermione reached out.
Following the pathways through her arms down inside of her, she found her magic pool in that deep wordless place inside of her, with the air elemental dancing around inside and the earth elemental a steady presence at the base. The rest of the magic just felt like wordless potential, really, with no clear identity. Aware of her own awareness, Hermione pushed herself closer to the magic pool, before finally extending herself into her magic, letting it roll over her awareness in waves.
It felt like her brain was put into an electrically-charged vat, with tingles running along the actual neurons her brain. Her magic was nothing but energy, it seemed, with wisps of thought and emotion floating in it from time to time. Quiet whispers of concepts brushed against her mind, and Hermione tried to immerse herself even further.
"Let go of yourself, Hermione." Tom's voice sounded distant, distorted. "You're feeling your magic, but let your magic feel you."
Not sure how she managed it, Hermione took herself, her core sense of self, and let it go.
Immediately it became different. Left with only a dim awareness that she was a person, Hermione was now far more aware of the emotions and feelings that permeated her magic, each idea and concept overwhelming her entirely as it drifted by, engulfing her in the entirety of its being and passion until drifting on, leaving her reeling for a moment until another came along and engulfed her. Hermione kept her breathing even and her mind free and open, letting each feeling consume her one by one.
There was a strong feeling of Autonomy, a desire to be self-determined and independent. There was a strength and surge of Passion, the want to have deep feelings about anything and everything: ideas, activities, people. There was a desire for Self-knowledge, to have a deep and honest understanding of herself, but even as her awareness felt that concept, there was simultaneously a struggle inherent with it; even though she desired self-knowledge, it seemed, it was hard to grasp.
There was a strong desire for Justice inside of her magic, as well as a desire for Challenge and a want of Mastery. She could feel a determination for realism, to see and act realistically and practically, as well as a longing for Creativity, though that one seemed to slip through her fingers even as she reached for it. There were strong feelings of Knowledge, Purpose, Growth, Friendship that echoed around her, and as Hermione let herself drift in her magic, all these concepts and ideals teased at her awareness in an all-engulfing way without words.
This was her, she realized distantly. These ideas, these values… they were her.
These values were what composed the core of the person who was Hermione Granger, which was how she hadn't felt them in her magic before – she'd needed to forget who she was to realize they were there. Her very identity permeated her magic, the parts that made her her, what drove her own direction in life, and it was with this realization that Hermione slowly came back to herself, feeling as if waking up from a long dream, slowly emerging from a pool as if reborn.
Her eyes slowly opened, and Tom was watching her, his eyes on hers.
"Did you feel it?" he asked.
Hermione's mouth was dry. "Accio."
With the strong feeling of identity still flowing through her, the core knowledge of who she was saturating her mind and her magic, Hermione could feel the magic in her reach out and across the yard to a stick under the tree, charging it and swapping the magical polarity effortlessly. Her magic flowed back into her naturally, its goal complete, but its purpose and sense of Hermione-ness never dissipating into nothing as it had before.
The stick was sent flying across the yard back to her on the back of her magic in the air, and Hermione caught it. She met Tom's gaze, head held high, and he slowly gave her a pleased smirk, his pride in her shining through his eyes and smile.
"Well done, Hermione," he murmured, his eyes dark. "Well done indeed."